


Isn't It Just So Pretty

by rickyisms



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Internalized Homophobia, Internalized Transphobia, M/M, Vignette, at first at least, but he doesn't really know, genderqueer kent parson, kent parson can have little a gender as a treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-16
Updated: 2020-10-04
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:33:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 18,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26487985
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rickyisms/pseuds/rickyisms
Summary: Kent Parson and Gender.You know how after you come out, you start thinking back and you come up with a bunch of moments that at the time should have made things obvious? These are Kent Parson's
Relationships: Kent "Parse" Parson/Connor "Whiskey" Whisk
Comments: 31
Kudos: 163





	1. Were there clues I didn't see?

**Author's Note:**

> a disclaimer!  
> Kent is not nice to himself in his own head, mostly because he doesn't know what's going on in there

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a little bit slapped together and I'm not sure how much sense it makes tbh but I liked writing it quite a lot

Kent Parson always checks the box that says “male” at the doctor’s office, he still feels weird about it. He thinks it’s kind of funny when people call him “sir,” nobody’s ever called him “ma’am,” but the idea is equally humorous. He doesn’t mind when Swoops calls him one of the boys, but he also doesn’t mind when Swoops’ girlfriend invites him over for girls night. He likes it when his boyfriend calls him pretty. And he has never, not once, told anyone about any of that. 

**The Earring**

Jack thinks this is the dumbest idea that Kent’s ever had. 

“Kenny, I can veto this, I’m the captain,” Jack says. 

“Nah, it’s fine, I lost the bet, I’d rather get my ears pierced than streak again, my dick’s still frozen from last weekend.”

“Shut up about your dick,” Jack mumbles. 

The boys are in a Vino’s billet basement. His host family let the kids drink and hang out in the basement, a “we’d rather know where you are,” kind of vibe. There’s cheap beer on the glass table, Kent’s had a couple shots, lost a push -up contest, and not he has to pay the price. 

He’s not as freaked out as he should be by the idea of Ty McTavern shoving a sewing needle through his ear, he’s still sitting in his spot on the couch, chill as ever. 

“Kenny, are you sure?” Jack asks. 

Kent shrugs. 

McTavern makes him sit on the floor. 

“Boys?” Tavy looks around, “Which one’s the gay ear?”

“Just do ‘em both,” Vino shrugs. 

“Hey,” Jack warns, “He didn’t agree to both.”

“It’s fine,” Kent says, “I’d rather have both ears pierced than just the gay ear pierced,” Kent laughs a little too hard. Jack shakes his head, almost imperceptibly rolls his eyes.

It hurts a little, like a slight pinch, but he’s drunk enough that he doesn’t mind when Tavy does the second one. 

Tavy snorts, “Man, you look satisfied with yourself, I should have made you streak.”

“He’d freeze his balls off,” Hunker calls from the beanbag chair in the corner. 

Kent catches a glimpse of himself in the bathroom mirror when he takes a piss later in the night. His ears feel just slightly heavier, but not in a bad way. The studs that Vino stole from his sister are small but they shine under the fluorescent light of the bathroom. He pokes the stud. Something in his stomach twists. It’s  _ pretty _ . Is he pretty? No, he’s 17 and he’s a guy and he’s playing hockey and 17 year old guys who play hockey don’t look pretty, that’s stupid. He’s drunk, this isn’t a big deal. 

It’s bad enough that he’s probably gay. It’s double bad enough that he thinks he might be in love with Jack. He can’t just brush that away the way they used to be able to when it started, when it could be brushed aside as teenage experimentation. Now that the line between best friend and guy who I get off with on roadies is blurred, Kent knows he can’t ignore that. He can ignore this though, won’t even think about it in the morning. 

He buys a pair of black studs the next time he’s at the mall with Jack. 

“So the holes won’t close,” he explains. 

“Ha, okay Kenny,” Jack says, he picks up a pair of dangly earrings, Kent can imagine the way they would sway when he walked if he decided to wear them, “Why don’t you get these,” he chuckles. 

“Fuck off Zimms,” Kent says, “I can’t sleep with those in,” he snatches the earrings and puts them back on the display rack. He marches over to the cashier before he can look twice at the earrings and pays for them. 

Kent has never stolen anything from a store in his life, but when he and Jack walk past the display on the way out of the store, Kent slides the dangly earrings into his shopping bag. He holds his breath until he gets out of the store, feels like he’s holding on to a bigger secret than just the fact that he’s stolen something. 

He and Jack spend a few hours in Kent’s billet room. They’re supposed to be doing homework but Jack ends up on top of him pretty quickly. Kent likes Jack’s weight pressing him down into the mattress. It's comfortable. 

Jack’s hand cups the back of Kent’s neck while they make out. Jack brushes a strand of hair off Kent’s forehead. He gets sweet like this sometimes and Kent knows he’s not supposed to like it. He knows that if he wants to be able to brush this aside when people ask him about it, that he can’t crave that look in Jack’s eye. He can’t want this tenderness. 

Jack’s looking down, his thumb runs over the back of Kent’s earlobe where he’s already put the studs. 

“What do you think?” Kent asks. 

“They’re neat,” Jack says, “A little weird maybe. Not used to them yet I guess.” Kent brings their lips together again so he doesn’t have to talk about it. 

Jack spends the night, he falls asleep first, always falls asleep first, he has a lot more to be tired about than Kent. Kent gets up in the middle of the night to get a glass of water when he remembers the earrings in the bag. He tears them out of their cardboard packaging and sneaks down the hall. His hands shake as he turns them over, holds them up to the light to see the way they glitter. They’re cheap, not real gold, but Kent thinks the colour looks nice against his skin. 

He takes out the black studs and sets them on the counter. He doesn’t realize he’s holding his breath until the second one is in and he’s staring himself down in the mirror. He feels like he’s going to get caught so he quickly takes them out and shoves them back into his pockets, puts the black ones back in and swallows hard. But he takes one last look at himself. There was something about the weight of them that felt good. Something about being shiny and gold that’s just  _ nice.  _

Sometimes the boys joke that Kent and Jack are married and Kent is Jack’s wife. It doesn’t bother him as much as he thinks they want it to. It wouldn’t be so bad, he thinks, to be Jack’s wife. 

**The Glitter**

The WAGs like Kent. He’s young and funny and charming, and most importantly to them, single. They make jokes about him being their collective boyfriend all the time. He’s 19 and he craves that kind of shallow attention, so he soaks it up whenever he can get it. 

Kent hangs out with Swoops most of the time but the two of them get invited to parties by the older guys, especially around the holidays. They show up at one of their house’s on New Years and Kent is predictably whisked away to talk to the girlfriends while Swoops is offered a beer. 

“Fuck he’s not even trying and girls are all over him,” one of the older guys, Glin, remarks. 

“It’s the pretty boy thing, don’t take it personal that you’re ugly,” their goalie, Breaker quips. 

Kent rolls his eyes, but the word sticks in his head.  _ Pretty.  _ He’s not pretty. Because he’s 19 and he’s in the NHL, he’s not supposed to be pretty. It’s an insult, he thinks, it’s gotta be. Hockey players aren’t pretty. They lose teeth and get punched, and Kent’s covered in bruises pretty much all the time. Maybe he should get his nose broken and then he won’t have to worry about pretty anymore. 

Glin’s girlfriend, Sandy, hands him a cooler and she sits on the counter. They’re pre-gaming and then they’re heading to a New Year’s Eve party, most of the girls are still getting ready in the master bedroom so Sandy takes him by the hand and pulls him down the hallway. He sits on the edge of the bed while Sandy does her makeup in front of the mirror. Breaker’s wife is touching up her eyeliner. 

“I think you’d look cute with eyeliner,” she says. 

“Ha,” Kent says, “No way.”

“Ugh,” Sandy rolls her eyes at him, “You have such long eyelashes too, it would be pretty.”

“Mmm what if you let me put glitter on your cheeks,” Breaker’s wife suggests, “It would make your cheekbones pop.”

“My cheekbones absolutely do not need to pop,” Kent says. 

Sandy looks really pretty, with winged eyeliner and bold golden glitter surrounding her eyes. She always looks pretty, Kent thinks, in an older sister kind of way. She has a round face and a crooked kind of smile. She’s blonde and thin and she looks like pretty much all his teammate’s wives but when she smiles it goes through her whole body and she always makes sure everyone’s having a good time. Sometimes Kent thinks she should just walk away from Glin since he’s the ugliest and meanest guy Kent has ever played with and he won’t even propose to her, but Sandy just carries on, walking half a step behind her boyfriend cleaning up after him. 

“Well no glitter then,” Sandy says, “but at least do a shot with us.”

Sandy picks up three shot glasses and a bottle of vodka from her vanity. She pours three shots and hands the tallest one to Kent. 

“To the 2010s!” Sandy grins and they all throw their shots back. 

Kent has gotten far better at shooting liquor than he’d ever like to admit. 

They celebrate Breaker’s wife finishing her eyeliner with another round of shots and Kent starts to feel it. He looks over at Breaker’s wife. Looks at the palette of glitter in front of her. He bets it would feel nice on his skin, he bets if he put it under his eyes he’d see it sparkling out of the corner of his eye all night. 

They head back into the living room, taxis already called. Swoops hands him a half finished beer and Kent finishes it for him. It’s a wordless exchange. 

“Dude, I think the ladies got some glitter on you,” Swoops says. 

“What? Where?” Kent says, paranoid and swipes at his own face. 

“Chill, it’s just on your eyebrow,” Swoops says, he tries to wipe it away but he shakes his head, “It’s glitter bro, it may never come off.”

“You might as well let me give you glitter eyebrows now,” Breaker’s wife grins. 

And Kent, three shots and half a beer in just says, “Yeah fine, fuck it.”

So he sits still while they wait for the cars and Breaker’s wife lines glitter over his brow bone. 

It’s a joke, all very funny, haha, nothing even a little bit serious about this. 

“Kinda gay, isn’t it Parse?” Glin asks. 

“Fuck off,” Kent mutters, eyes still closed. 

“Told you, chicks dig the pretty boy thing,” Breaker waves him off and Kent breathes a sigh of relief. 

“Boy’s getting all the pussy tonight,” Swoops claps him on the shoulder. 

God, he hates that his best friend doesn’t even know. 

Kent doesn’t get ID’d, not at the clubs the Aces go to, with the private booths and the bouncers that just let them in without waiting. 

He’s less drunk now so his first priority is ordering a round of shots. He can feel the glitter against his skin and every time he moves it shines in the light. It feels good in a way he doesn’t have words for. But he knows somewhere inside of himself that he shouldn’t feel like this. That 19 year old dudes who play in the NHL aren’t supposed to feel like this. So Kent gets up, some of the other guys have already started dancing and he hopes that it’s dark enough that no one can see how he stumbles, no one can see the weird expression on his face. The men’s room is empty and he locks the door behind him. He’s breathing heavier than the situation really warrants. 

It’s glitter, haha funny. He’s acting like a pretty boy, that’s funny. It’s a joke, it’s dumb. He looks up at himself in the mirror. It’s a joke, it’s just a joke. But god, he wants to dance. He wants the weird lights to make his face look different and he wants to sparkle. He wants someone to look at him the way Breaker’s looking at his wife. He wants to kiss someone and for the glitter on his face to stay on their face. 

And he can’t. 

He can’t want that. 

He gets a wad of toilet paper wet and he scrubs at his brow bone. It’s not coming off so he makes the water hotter and he scrubs harder and harder and harder until the toilet paper is dissolving and his skin is raw and the glitter is still there so he must not be trying hard enough and he has to try harder, god he has to try harder, it’s not coming off because he secretly wants it there, that must be it. He has to hate it, he can’t like this, he can’t want it. 

**Jeff**

Kent tells Jeff that he thinks he’s probably gay one night in their second year with the Aces. They live together,mostly at Jeff’s insistence. “Come on Parser, it’ll be easier to learn how to be grown ups if you do it with a friend,” Kent had reluctantly agreed. 

He wishes he lived alone now though, because then he could self destruct in peace. Jack changed his number. All Kent wants to do is take the bottle of vodka out of the fridge, drink exactly all of it, punch something, and then cry while he listens to loud music. 

Jeff notices him taking the vodka out of the freezer. 

“Where you going with that?” Swoops asks. 

“Uhhh,” Kent stammers. 

“If you wanted to drink you could have just asked,” Swoops gestures for Kent to come sit on the couch next to him.

Kent laughs. 

“Thanks,” he says. 

“Are you uh… you good?”

Kent shrugs, “Just your average 19 year old bullshit,” Kent chuckles, dry and bitter. 

He unscrews the vodka bottle and shrugs. He raises it to his lips. 

“You’re not even gonna mix it?” Swoops puts his hand on Kent’s wrist. 

Kent shrugs, “I’m looking for efficiency here, Swoops.”

Swoops doesn’t laugh at his joke. Kent hopes he doesn’t ask where the other freezer bottle went. 

“Dude,” Swoops says. 

Kent hands him the bottle, “Come on, let’s get drunk and bitch.”

“About what?”

“Whatever you want,” Kent finally gets to take a swig, it burns, sickly comforting on the way down. 

“Well I’m still pissed off that they made us do a bag skate even after we won.”

“It wasn’t so bad,” Kent shrugs. 

“You’re small and fast, that’s your thing, fuck off.”

Kent passes the bottle to Swoops. Swoops shakes his head, walks over the fridge and pours himself some orange juice. He pours the vodka on top, it’s a shitty mix, but it is infinitely less depressing than Kent’s plan to blackout. 

Swoops takes a swig, scowls, “We don’t have to buy Smirnoff anymore, Parse. You can afford decent shit.”

“I like smirnoff,” Kent says. Maybe too embarrassed to admit that he doesn’t exactly know what the good stuff is, doesn’t know how to ask where to find it. 

Swoops grimaces, “Tastes like regret.”

“Maybe I like regret,” Kent mumbles. 

“You’re a drama queen.”

“At least I’m a queen,” Kent says over an unexpected hitch in his voice. 

“Nah you’re royalty whether you’re dramatic or not,” Swoops says. 

“Don’t go soft on me.”

“I mean, you’re the king of west coast hockey,” Swoops shrugs, marketing department picked it, not me. 

“Maybe I could be the queen of something too,” Kent mumbles. 

“Huh?”

“Nevermind,” he says quickly, cuts himself off by taking a sip. 

Swoops just shrugs, takes a long sip of his drink, looks forward at their (frankly too big) TV. There’s a Raptors game on TV. He tries to focus on what’s going on, but Swoops is cheering for the Raptors and they’re shit and Kent has no investment in the Heat, who they’re playing, so he just sits there, curled up in the corner of the couch, cradling a vodka bottle, occasionally taking a sip until things start to get fuzzy, he starts to feel heavy and warm and he forgets that he’s supposed to care who has more points or that they want him to be the captain or that Jack changed his number. 

Jack changed his number 

Fuck. 

“I think I’m gonna go now,” Kent says. He stands up, stumbles backwards, falls back down onto the couch. 

“Woah,” Swoops says, noticing how empty the vodka bottle has gotten, “you good?”

“Nope!” Kent answers, sarcastically cheerful. 

“If I’d known it took half a bottle to get you to finally admit that I would have done it months ago,” Swoops says. 

“Don’t wanna talk about it,” Kent mumbles. 

“Why not?” Swoops asks. 

“It’s mine,” Kent says. 

“What’s yours?”

“The baggage, the secrets, whatever, you don’t have to deal with my dumb shit.”

“Parser, we’re friends.”

“Maybe we wouldn’t be if you knew everything about me.”

“That’s not true,” Swoops says. 

“I suck.”

“Dude,” Swoops cocks an eyebrow. 

“No I am,” he says, “I broke Jack,” he slurs, “I broke him, he should be here, he should be your best friend, not me, I don’t deserve this,” Kent thinks he should be more emotional than he is. Maybe he should cry, maybe he should be raising his voice, but he’s not. He’s flat. 

“Parse, dude, you can’t control that shit.”

Kent shakes his head, “I should have tried. I didn’t see any of it, or I didn’t want to see it? I dunno.”

“You were still in high school, how are you supposed to know that shit’ going on with your friend in high school?”

“More than friends,” Kent mumbles and then he buries his head in his hands.

“Parse?” Swoops says it carefully.

“I can’t say it,” Kent mutters. He doesn't know how many bottles of vodka it would take to get him to say it. 

“Well it’s uh… this isn’t something I want to make assumptions about, buddy.”

“Whatever,” Kent whispers, he won’t look at Swoops. He can’t. 

“Well,” Kent gets the impression that Swoops is treading lightly, “It’s uh-” he cuts himself off like needs to choose his words carefully, “If it’s something like-” cuts himself off again, “If it’s the thing I think it is…” he trails off, “That would be fine. It wouldn’t uh, wouldn’t change anything.”

Kent shakes his head, still doesn’t speak. 

“Parser, it’s fine if your gay,” Swoops finally out and says it, exasperation in his voice. 

Kent swallows a lump in his throat. He sits still, petrified, like Swoops is going to hit him, or get up or scoot away from him on the couch so that their legs aren’t touching anymore. But he doesn’t do any of that. 

“We’re still gonna be friends,” Swoops says. 

“Not the same,” Kent can’t string more than half a sentence together. 

“The fuck are you talking about?”Swoops says. 

Kent finally looks up and Swoops is looking at him like he’s an idiot, or maybe Swoops is the idiot, either way he looks confused. 

“Parse I don’t care if you like dudes or if you and Zimmermann were a thing, it’s  _ fine,  _ you put up with my dumb dating shit.”

“You…” Kent trails off, “This is dumb but like… you’re still comfortable around me even if I am…” he can’t make himself say the word. 

“Why the fuck wouldn’t I be?”

“I dunno, maybe I’d like, come on to you?”

“I like to think you have better taste,” Swoops jokes. It pulls a laugh out of Kent, it feels nice. 

“And it’s not like you’re… I dunno, you’re chill about it, it’s whatever.”

Right. Kent’s chill. He’s lowkey. He has his ears pierced but it was a joke, he doesn’t like… do drag and paint his nails. No one knows because no one needs to know. He can keep this under wraps, he plays hockey, he’s a dude,there’s nothing  _ weird  _ or  _ wrong _ about him. It’s reassuring in a way. He’s just a normal dude who secretly likes other dudes. Big deal, what’s wrong with secrets. 

**Jeff’s Cool Girlfriend**

Swoops has a girlfriend. And he seems serious about her this time. Who knows though, Swoops goes through girlfriends like some people go through toilet paper. 

“I dunno, Parse, I really fucking like her,” he says.

“This is a breakthrough for you, dude,” Kent says. 

They’re in Jeff’s apartment, he’s enlisted Kent’s help in cleaning his kitchen before the girl gets here for dinner. Kent’s a good friend, so he’ll do maid duty and then make himself scarce, Swoops would do the same for him, even if Kent would never ask. 

“What’s her name again?” Kent asks, he has his head in the oven trying to scrape off burnt cheese. 

“Kelli,” Swoops answers. He tosses a carton of milk into the garbage can that they’ve put in the centre of the kitchen. 

“Cute,” Kent rolls his eyes, “Let me guess, blond 5’2”, massive tits?” 

A soaking wet washcloth hits Kent in the back of the neck. 

“Dude!”

“Don’t be gross,” Swoops scolds him. 

“I’m not gross, just observant, you have a type.”

“Fuck you,” Swoops grimaces, “She is blonde though,” he mutters. 

Kent throws the washcloth back at Swoops, Swoops catches it so it’s not as satisfying as he would have hoped. 

Kent knows that Swoops is kind of a slob from when they lived together, but it’s very quickly becoming clear that when left to his own devices, Swoops is downright disgusting. 

“You know you could get a cleaning service in here,” Kent says. 

“Ah, it’s not that bad,” Swoops waves him off. 

“Dude, your food is growing other food. 

Swoops shrugs, “It’s not my fault you’re weirdly clean, you never even leave the toilet seat up.”

“Yeah, because I’m a civilized human being.”

Kent’s plan is to dip like an hour before Kelli shows up, but Jeff’s place is grosser than anticipated so he stays a while longer. They’re not expecting Kelli to show up early. 

“Fuck,” Kent says, “Should I hide? That’s weird, I’ll just tell her I’m heading out. Right?”

“Yeah,” Swoops says, “Yeah that’s fine.”

Kent stands with his hands in his pockets in the middle of the living room, not sure what to do with himself while Swoops opens the door. 

He hears a California accent and a rolling laugh. 

“Did you light a candle?” she asks. 

“Yep,” Swoops says, proud of himself. Kent lit the candle, but he’ll give this one to Swoops. 

“I’m-” Kent doesn’t get to say the  _ I’m gonna head out,  _ part because Kelli interrupts him. 

“You’re Kent,” she smiles, “Jeff talks about you all the time.”

“Not  _ all  _ the time,” Swoops blushes. 

“Aw, Swoopsy,” Kent teases. 

“I’ve been dying to meet you,” Kelli says. 

“I should head out,” Kent says. 

“At least stay until dinner gets here,” Kelli grins. 

“Are you sure?” Kent asks, looking more at Swoops than Kelli. 

“Yeah, why not,” Swoops shrugs. 

Long story short, Swoops has three bottles of wine in his fridge and they finish all of them. Kent tries to leave a couple times but Kelli keeps telling him to stay, and eventually, it just feels nice to hang out with someone. 

It’s dumb, he knows it’s dumb… but he hangs out with hockey players most of the time, he can’t remember the last time he’s had a conversation with a girl and it’s just  _ nice.  _

He’s a little bit ashamed to admit that Kelli’s not what he expected out of one of Swoops’ girlfriends. It’s not his fault that every single one of his teammate’s partners is an Instagram model. 

She’s pretty, for sure, but she’s also kind of weird and loud and she calls Jeff out when he says something dumb, and all in all, Kent really likes her. 

She puts on some music and they’re all drunk enough that when she stands on top of the couch, wine bottle in hand and starts dancing, that Swoops and Kent join in. They’re loud and dumb and Kent smiles even though he knows he’s third wheeling  _ hard  _ right now. But Kelli takes his hand and pulls him up on the couch and she puts his hands on her shoulders and her hands on his hips and leads. 

“Come on, do a lil twirl,” she says. 

“No way,” Kent laughs, his cheeks are already flushed from the wine. 

“Come on,” Kelli prompts. 

“Fine,” Kent relents. 

She takes his hand and holds it above her head, he has to duck considerably to twirl underneath her arm. They both laugh. 

Swoops passes out on the couch by midnight but Kelli and Kent are still awake. 

“Thanks for letting me stay,” Kent says. 

“Yeah,” Kelli says, “I wanted to meet Jeff’s best friend anyway, I had fun.”

“Sorry I kind of crashed your date.”

“Ah don’t worry about it, we’re going rock climbing tomorrow anyway,” she waves him off. 

“Cool.”

Kent legitimately cannot remember the last time he talked to someone who wasn’t on his hockey team or in some way related to his hockey team. He signed a jersey for a kid at the all star game, does that count?

“Do you want to go outside?” Kelli asks, she jerks her head to the balcony. 

“I talk loud, I don’t want to wake my sleeping prince up,” she laughs, clamps her hand over her mouth, because she does indeed, talk loud. 

Kent nods. Kelli picks up a half drank bottle of wine and opens the sliding glass door. 

It’s well past sunset and the lights in Swoops’ condo are off, but it’s still not dark, the moon is bright and the lights of the city are relentless. He looks over at Kelli, sitting with her back to the strip, she looks pretty lit up by neon lights. Kent wonders, just briefly, if he could ever look that pretty. Then he reminds himself that it’s a stupid thing to wonder. 

“So how’d you and Swoops meet?” Kent asks, he’s got his knees pulled up to his chest on the chair, it’s not how he sits in front of guys, Kelli doesn’t even seem to notice. 

“Tinder,” Kelli shrugs, she grabs the wine bottle from the middle of Swoops’ patio table and takes a sip. 

“How modern,” Kent makes a joke. 

“Honestly I’d just got dumped and I was really only looking for a rebound,” she snorts. 

“And you rebounded with Jeff Troy?” Kent cocks an eyebrow. 

She shrugs, “He’s really not my type.”

“Really?” Kent asks. 

“I usually go for artsy guys I guess, musicians, drummers” she shrugs, “and women.”

“Oh?” Kent says. 

She shrugs again, takes a longer sip of her drink. 

“Is that like, a problem?”

“No!” Kent says quickly, “God, no, uh, fuck, shit. I didn’t mean…”

“Sorry,” she says, “I just-” cuts herself off, “I’m not quite sure where most hockey players stand on like, social issues, I didn’t mean to assume. You just seem-”

“Nah,” Kent says, “Fair assumption. There are some assholes.”

“You’re not one of them?”

“I try not to be.”

“Cool, not a hockey dude then.”

“At least not all the way,” Kent says. 

Kent feels a little weird, but in a good way. It’s confusing. Like he’s safe here, like Kelli can understand a part of him that Swoops wouldn’t. And it’s been so long since he’s felt like anyone understood that specific part of him.

Kent takes another sip of wine and before he can stop himself says, 

“I’m gay, I don’t know why I wanted to tell you that.”

“Oh, cool,” she says, “I’m bisexual.”

Kent nods. She really is, like, so pretty. Kent wonders briefly if he’s jealous of that fact. He takes another fast gulp of the wine. 

“You okay?” She asks, “You look pale.”

“Weird thought,” he shrugs, “No big deal.”

“You want to share with the class?”

“No,” Kent says, and it’s firm. 

He buries that idea well in the back of his brain. Crashes on the couch later that night and refuses to even think about it. 

  
  
  


**Nail Polish II**

Kent Parson knew he was fucked the second he met Connor Whisk. He knew it and he still went for it, because he couldn’t resist, because he’s stupid, because Connor Whisk made him feel special and smart and he noticed every little thing that made Kent feel like that. Every little gesture, every word, and he seemed to file them away for later use. 

He calls Kent  _ pretty.  _

_ Pretty.  _

That word. Because Kent made a joke once, “Would you still think I’m pretty if…”

And Whiskey had laughed, but he must have known Kent liked it. It throws him how much he likes it. How much he’s wanted that before. 

He supposes that he wanted Jack to think he was pretty, craved the look he got in his eyes when Kent looked good. It’s just validation, he thinks. It’s gotta be, that’s an easy explanation. Kent’s chest doesn’t swoop the same way when Whiskey calls him hot though. 

They’re in bed in Whiskey’s room at Samwell one night and Whiskey’s just painted his nails with a bottle of blue nail polish that Ford left on Whiskey’s night stand. Whiskey has Kent tucked up against his body. His eyes are closed arms wrapped around Kent. Kent catches sight of his own fingernails, looks at Whiskey’s. Whiskey already picked most of his polish off. He wiggles his fingers just to make sure that they’re really his. 

And then. 

_ Panic.  _

He feels like he’s 19 again and standing in the bathroom at a nightclub on New Years Eve desperately trying to scrub glitter off of his face. Like a 19 year old standing in front of other people knowing that they’re looking at him differently,  _ wanting  _ them to look at him differently but knowing that he shouldn’t want that, knowing that he should be ashamed. And he looks at his nails, how the blue looks against his skin, how his fingers look resting against Whiskey’s arm. 

He can’t. 

He’s not stupid, he knows that people can wear nail polish, he knows that guys wear makeup and paint their nails and wear skirts. He just doesn’t think it’s such a  _ thing  _ for them. So he gets up, he moves Whiskey’s arm out of the way and slides out of bed and he walks to the bathroom and his fingers wrap around the porcelain sink. And he’s digging through the medicine cabinet and of course there’s not nail polish remover down here, Ford definitely has that and he can’t sneak upstairs in the middle of the night to find some. He’s white knuckling the sink. He won’t cry, that’s stupid.

“Baby?” Whiskey’s voice is muffled from outside the door which Kent stupidly left open a crack.

Whiskey pokes his head around the door. He’s tired, Kent can see it in his posture and hear it in his voice. 

“Sweetheart?” Whiskey’s voice is lower, gentler, “Are you okay.”

“Need to get the nail polish off,” Kent mumbles. 

Whiskey steps all the way into the bathroom, closes the door behind him. 

“I thought you liked it,” Whiskey cocks an eyebrow. 

“I do,” Kent says. 

“Then why take it off.”

“It’s,” Kent trips over his words. “I- uh. Fuck,”

God how much of an idiot must he look like right now. Dramatic for no reason. Why does this feel like such a big deal? 

“It’s okay,” Whiskey says, “Did I do a bad job?”

“No!” Kent says quickly, “No, it’s beautiful and I love it,” Kent says, he’s talking a mile a minute, “But I just… I have to take it off.”

Whiskey steps forward, takes Kent’s hand in his and presses his lips to the back of it. 

“It’s okay.”

“What if it’s not,” Kent whispers, “What if I’m not?”

“It’s just nail polish,” Whiskey says, “Come here,” Whiskey pulls Kent into a hug, Whiskey’s warm even though he sleeps without a shirt. 

But what if the nail polish is more than just nail polish. What if it’s a box he shouldn’t open? 

Kent shakes just a little in Whiskey’s arms so Whiskey squeezes harder, kisses the side of Kent’s face. 

“If you really want to take it off I can get nail polish remover from Foxtrot in the morning, but for now just come back to bed, okay?”

“Okay. Yeah.” Kent agress. 

“I think it looks good,” Whiskey says, “I like it on you, a lot, but if you don’t…”

“I do like it,” Kent says. 

Whiskey’s doing his best to seem understanding but Kent knows he must seem weird right now. 

“I get it if you don’t want other people to see.”

“That’s not it either,” Kent says. 

“Then what’s wrong?”

“I really don’t know,” Kent says, “I liked it,” he mumbles, “That you didn’t laugh.”

“Why would I laugh?”

Kent shrugs, “I’ve worn eyeliner and makeup and stuff before but it was always as a joke, like I wasn’t supposed to actually like it, like it was always,  _ “let’s put the pretty boy in lipstick,”  _ but I wasn’t supposed to like it and then I guess… I dunno, I freak out when I do like it.”

Whiskey’s brow is furrowed. Kent can tell that this is maybe something a little out of his depth, but he’s trying. God, he’s so in love. 

“If I ever do anything that freaks you out… Like calling you pretty if that’s something that-”

“No,” Kent cuts him off, “No, I really like that, you should keep doing that.”

Whiskey breaks into a little smile. 

“I think you’ll look really pretty next to me in bed, asleep.”

Kent blushes as Whiskey takes his hand and they trudge back to Whiskey’s room. Whiskey kisses him on the tip of his nose and the top of his head and the side of the cheek. 

“I love you.”

“I love you too.”

“Am I weird?” Kent asks a few seconds later. 

“I mean…” Whiskey trails off, “What’s the standard?”

“Like, normal dude.”

“I dunno if that’s even a thing.”

“What just happened though,” Kent holds up his painted nails, “Was that weird?”

“Maybe a little,” Whiskey admits, “I love you no matter what. Even if you are weird.”

The lump that has been in Kent’s throat, maybe forever, gets a little bit smaller as Whiskey’s breathing starts to slow down and Kent feels his breath hot against his neck. 

“No matter what,” Whiskey mutters half asleep. 

_ No Matter What.  _

Kent goes to sleep holding Whiskey’s hand. He takes a deep shaky breath. At least here, he has that, he has  _ No Matter What.  _ No Matter What this  _ Thing,  _ is.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's definitely going to be a second chapter to this that involves Whiskey being a very good boyfriend, and it should be less angsty. idk if angsty's the right word. There's some inherent angst that goes along with questioning your gender i think. It eez complicated.  
> As always, comments are genuinely very helpful (and motivate me to keep writin more tbh)


	2. Cuttin' me open, then healin' me fine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay so i lied, there will be 3 chapters because this was getting WAY too fucking long

It’s not the same as those earrings that he stole from the mall when he was 16, but he still feels wrong about it. 

He snatches the package out of the mailbox, he hides it behind his back, runs down the hallway to the bedroom. Whiskey’s at the gym, but Kent still feels his heart racing, like he’s doing something wrong like he doesn’t want to be caught holding it. He closes the door behind him. Tears open the box and sets it down on the bed. 

It was dumb to order it in the first place. What’s the point in having a nail kit if he’s too weirded out by the concept to wear it in front of anybody. Still, there’s something about it that feels nice to hold. He picks up a bottle of top coat, it’s nice, clear but shiny. There are gems buried deeper in the box, little rhinestones that he could make more intricate designs with if he ever bothered to learn. He slips one of them into his pocket, doesn’t think about why. He closes the box, walks over to the closet and puts it under a pile of sweaters.

If he was willing to do even an ounce more self reflection he’d probably chuckle at the metaphor of shoving it in the closet. As it stands though, he’s on auto-pilot. 

“Kent?” Whiskey calls, Kent hears the front door close behind him. 

“I’m in the bedroom,” Kent says, his voice shakes, he clears his throat as he stands up and walks into the hallway, “How was the gym?”

He plants a small kiss on Whiskey’s cheek, but Whiskey wraps his arms around Kent’s waist and pulls him in for a deeper kiss. Kent closes his eyes and leans into it. 

“Sucked,” Whiskey mutters, “Gym’s the gym, always sucks.”

Kent nods. 

“What’d you get up to?” Whiskey asks. 

“Nothing,” Kent says, maybe a little too defensively, but Whiskey doesn’t ask. 

He just hooks his thumbs around the belt loops in Kent’s jeans and pulls him down the hallway, Kent jumps, raises an eyebrow. 

“I need to have a shower,” he smirks. 

Kent licks his lips, looks Whiskey up and down. 

“Need some help?”

Whiskey breaks into a grin and leans forward to kiss Kent. 

Whiskey goes back to Samwell a few days later, fall reading break is over. Kent knows he was lucky to get to spend any time with Whiskey so close to midterms, but it still sucks when he leaves. 

He’s always mopey the day after Whiskey flies home. Looks at his cat and commiserates. It helps him get over himself that he has a game tonight. That’s at least a routine to follow. He eats lunch, takes a nap,eats dinner and then goes to the rink. 

That’s what he usually does at least. He pulls the blackout curtains over his bedroom window and he lays down but he can’t sleep. He wanders around the bedroom, maybe pacing will wear him out. It doesn’t. 

The closet door is open just a crack. A pile of sweaters catches his eye. He knows what’s underneath them. He kicks the sweaters out of the way, picks up the box. Kent sits cross legged on the bed. There are at least a dozen different colours, a base coat, a top coat and some gems. He picks a mostly transparent glittery colour. It’ll be easy to get off, because there’s no way he’s showing up to the rink with it on. He doesn’t bother with the base coat because he’s just going to take it off. 

He swipes the brush over his thumb first, does his right hand. It looks alright. The glitter catches in the bedroom light and he likes the way that the polish feels on his nails, cold, a little bit stiff. He blows on them while he waits for them to dry. There’s a little bit of polish on his fingertip but it looks alright, not bad. His left hand turns out terribly because even though he’s mostly ambidextrous on the ice, he’s very much left handed off of it. If he only looks at his right hand, it looks pretty good. The glitter would look nicer with a second coat, but he still has to take this off and he doesn’t have time for a second coat. 

He feels like he’s been holding his breath and he’s finally let himself exhale. He snaps a quick picture of his right hand. Takes a video of himself wiggling his fingers with the flash on. He doesn’t send it to anyone, moves it to the private folder on snapchat. 

He looks down again, the alarm that was supposed to wake him up from his nap goes off and he’s holding his breath again, feels like he’s suffocating. He runs to the bathroom, grabs a wad of toilet paper. He soaks it in nail polish remover, the fumes hit his nose right away but it gets the nail polish off. It leaves his skin feeling dry but it’s gone. He exhales even though he still feels like he’s holding his breath.

Swoops is waiting for him in the player’s lounge, he throws a can of red bull at him and Kent catches it in his left hand. They pop the tabs at the same time and then clink the cans against each other. They do this before every game, at least since Swoops became a redbull athlete when they were 23. Once they couldn’t find redbull so they used gatorade and they got blown out. So yeah, redbull before every game. 

“He leave today?” Swoops says. 

“Am I that obviously bummed out?”

Swoops shrugs. 

They don’t say much else. Kent heads to the dressing room. Takes off his suit and puts on his underarmour. They have a strategy meeting before warmup, Kent sits with Swoops and Scrappy in the back. He does his best to pay attention, but Coach’s advice basically amounts to “good fucking luck,” because the Canucks are on an 11 game winning streak and so far they haven’t cracked. Kent’s determined though. He doesn’t give up so easily. 

“You’re coming to ours this weekend, right?” Swoops asks after the meeting. 

“Uh,” Kent says. 

“Halloween, dumbass,” Swoops says. 

“Right,” Kent says, “Yeah, obviously I’m coming. Don’t have a costume though.”

“Whatever,” Swoops shrugs, “I’m sure Kelli has an extra pair of cat ears or something.”

The game goes terribly. Scraps gets hurt in the second, a fact made worse by the fact that it’s an accident, tripped over a Canucks’ stick and crashes into Breaker’s net, catches his ankle the wrong way and has to be helped off the ice. 

It’s a blowout. Kent scores once, but it doesn’t matter in the end, the Aces lose 6-1. The dressing room is quiet. He manages to get out a few sentences about the game when the journalists come over to his stall. He sighs, “Our compete level just wasn’t there tonight, we were in our own heads about it. All we can do is forget about it and come back stronger.”

Kent goes home, undoes his tie, pets Kit on the head and walks into the bedroom. He sees the box of nail polish still on his bed and his throat closes. That’s the only thing he did different today. And maybe it’s not the nail polish that fucked him up, maybe it was the way it made him feel. He likes it too much, he worries about how everyone else would see it even more. He closes the box, throws it back in the closet, slams the door shut. 

“Fuck,” he mutters. 

He picks up a towel from his shelf and walks into the bathroom. He catches sight of himself in the mirror. He looks tired. 

“Pull it together, man,” he mutters to himself. 

He makes extra sure to scrub at his hands in the shower. 

He goes to sleep wearing the hoodie that Whiskey left behind by “accident,” it smells like his detergent and that’s nice. 

Kent doesn’t know when Kelli and Swoops became the designated party host couple of the Las Vegas Aces, but he’s not complaining. It means he gets to show up early, doesn’t have to worry about what counts as fashionably late, and he has a guaranteed spot in their second guest bedroom.

He walks through the door with a bottle of pumpkin spice flavoured vodka and five bags of party sized tortilla chips. Before he can set them down on the table, Kelli shouts, 

“And where the fuck is your costume!”

“Where’s your?” Kent responds, she’s only wearing a pair of yellow bell-bottoms and a black t-shirt. 

“I live here, I’m going to put it on once I put the jello shots in the fridge.”

“Swoops told me you probably had an extra pair of cat ears or something.”

“Uh-uh, you were a rat last year, I am not giving you a cat costume, besides, you don’t have the boobs for it,”

“Rude,” Kent huffs.

“I also don’t have the boobs for it, I’m doing you a favour.”

Kelli hands Kent one of the jello shots without Kent asking and Kent drinks it. He gives her a thumbs up. 

“Can hardly taste the vodka.”

“Perfect,” she says. 

She puts her hands on her hips, “Okay, well, come look at my closet, we’ll find something for you to wear,” Kelli starts down the hallway. Kent opens the fridge to put away the jello shots.

“Grab me a beer while you’re in there!” she shouts. 

Kent grabs one for himself and one for Kelli.

There’s a yellow hat sitting on the bed. Kent picks it up. 

“Banana costume?”

“Swoops is Curious George, I’m the man in the yellow hat.”

“Isn’t the girl supposed to be Curious George?” Kent asks. 

“He’s a fucking monkey, Kent,” Kelli rolls her eyes, “And the pants make my ass look great,” she says. 

Kent finds himself wishing it were that simple without quite knowing what  _ it  _ is. 

“Okay, I have a sexy firefighter costume,” she says. 

“That feels like I’m trying too hard.”

“Good, because I don’t think the pants would fit.”

Kelli’s pulling a yellow blazer out of the closet. She looks nice. 

“You could do what I did last year and just do the whole punk thing, black jeans, I can give you some fishnets and a band t-shirt. Some eyeliner and boom, punk rock king.”

“Uh, sure,” Kent says, “Whatever.”

She hands him a t-shirt with a logo for The Clash on the front and a pair of fishnet stockings with the elastic waistband cut out. 

“Just wear them like a jacket,” she says, “don’t worry about ripping them, I don’t wear them anyway.”

Kent takes his own shirt off. The fishnets feel kind of strange against his skin, like he’s wearing sleeves and not at the same time. They’re a little tight around his biceps but they stretch to accommodate. He throws the t-shirt on over top and looks at himself in Kelli’s mirror. He shrugs. 

“Oh, you have your ears pierced!” she says, “Hold on!”

Kent watches her dig through a jewlry box until she produces a pair of earrings. They’re small hoops with multicoloured safety pins clipped onto them. They jingle when Kelli hands them to him. 

“If you want to, obviously,” she adds. 

He really does want to. Obviously he does, he doesn’t know why it’s obvious, just that it is. This shouldn’t be a big deal, he knows that at least four of his teammates are going to come to this party dressed as girls for a joke. But this doesn’t really feel like a joke. He knows guys dress like this, he knows Kelli has friends who dress like this, but it’s so much easier if it’s a joke. “Haha,” I’m wearing makeup, isn’t that funny! Because I’m a guy! Guys don’t wear makeup, so this is funny!”

So he laughs when he accepts the earrings. He takes a long sip of his beer before he puts them in. Turns his head to the side to hear the safety pins clack against one another. 

“How’s it look?”

Kent asks. 

“Very punk rock,” she answers. 

Kelli does her own makeup first and Kent’’s glad because it means he has time to finish his beer and convince himself that he’s cool. He’s chill, it’s fine, no worries here. Not a big deal. 

Kelli sits cross legged across from him while she does his eyeliner. She smudges it a little, makes it look messy and then hands him a mirror to look at it with. He exhales. 

“It looks good,” he laughs again. It’s easier to laugh. 

“It’s a lazy costume, but I’ll allow it,” Kelli teases him. 

Swoops gets home soon after and Kent has to help him do up the zipper for the monkey costume. It’s about a size to small so Swoops looks incredibly stupid. 

“You look decent, Parser,” Swoops says to him. 

Kent does his best to forget about the eyeliner, and honestly, it works pretty well. He catches a glimpse of himself off a reflective surface every now and then and he lets himself smile at it. Carlsson’s weaning clown makeup and Breaker and his wife are dressed like the twins from the shining. Kent’s not the only one being weird tonight. 

So he chills out, he gets belligerently drunk, makes Kelli play flip cup and challenges Breaker to a push up contest. His tongue turns purple before midnight because he’s had so many jello shots. 

Music is pumping and Kent’s feeling dizzy but in a nice way. He dances with Breaker’s wife. The wives like to dance with him because he’s the only one who has the strength and the willingness to do the dirty dancing choreography at any given time. One of his teammates is dressed as Andy from Parks and Rec, wearing an FBI jacket and reflective aviators to match. Kent’s listening to his story and he catches his reflection in them. And the guy’s taller than him so Kent looks a little small and he can see that he looks trashed but the first thing he notices is that eyeliner. It makes him look different. Not bad, just different. Not even necessarily feminine. The makeup isn’t supposed to make him look like a girl, it’s not even really supposed to be funny. But it does look like  _ something.  _ And the teammate who’s telling him a story about this girl he hooked up with last weekend is seeing it. He’s seeing the  _ something.  _ And Kent’s not even sure what that something is and he feels a little bit twisted up about it. 

Because he likes it, without question he likes the way he looks and he likes, to some extent that other people are seeing that. But he’s afraid too, he’s afraid that people see him like that more than it makes him happy. He’s afraid that someone’s going to say something or do something, and he’s especially afraid that he’s thinking about it now. 

And he’s drunk so all those thoughts that he throws to the back of his mind every day are pushing back to the front. He’s looking at all the wives and the girlfriends. His eyes catch on Breaker’s wife’s legs. They’re smooth, she’s wearing stockings, he thinks. He’s not looking at her legs because he wants  _ her  _ in any kind of way, he knows that. But maybe he should shave his legs once, just to see. The girl scrappy brought is throwing her head back laughing too hard at a joke that Kent knows wasn’t any good (because Scrappy made it, duh) and her lipstick smudges. Kent runs a finger over his mouth as if it were his own lipstick that had smudged. He looks at the fishnets he has on his arms, pokes the safety pins in his ears. Fuck he’s so afraid. 

He’s going to throw up or cry or scream, but no matter what he needs to stop looking at himself in John Hartley’s aviators. He doesn’t bolt right away, he just stands there with the panic building in his stomach, waits until Hartley finishes the story and then leaves. The bathroom is occupied, the bedroom doors are locked, so he does the next best thing and slips out the patio door onto the balcony. There’s no one out there but he still feels like he needs to hide. He sits on the cement bench behind a potted plant away from the outdoor dining table and barbeque. He pulls his knees up to his chest, tries to breath. It’s so hard to breath when you’re already holding your breath. He stops. He’s sitting like a girl. 

He’s  _ not  _ a girl. It’s stupid to think a girl can sit a certain way, it’s fine, he can sit like this and still be a man. He puts his legs down any way. Buries his head in his hands. There’s a gentle breeze, it reminds him to take another breath. 

Kent’s not a girl. He knows that, liking this shit doesn’t make him a girl. He catches his reflection in the window. He’s not a girl, he doesn’t want to be a girl. It’s not like he doesn’t like the way he looks, or at least, he doesn’t feel like he needs to change anything. But maybe he wants people to see him differently. Maybe he doesn’t want it to be a joke when Breaker’s wife puts glitter on his eyelids. He’s not a girl but he’s not  _ not  _ a girl. If that makes sense? It doesn’t even make sense to him. Because he’s not really a guy either but he’s not  _ not  _ a guy and he’s neither and both and he really really needs to stop thinking because painting his nails was one thing but this is a whole other and he really hopes he can forget this in the morning.

“Hey, Parser,” fuck. He doesn’t want to talk to Swoops right now. 

If he wasn’t in such a bad mood he’d laugh at Swoops. He’s pulled the monkey costume down, tied the arms around the waist and is now wearing them like pants.

“Shit,” Kent says. 

“You good, buddy?”

“Uh,” Kent says, “Fine,”

“You look kind of rattled, Hartley didn’t say anything dumb, right?”

“You don’t need to protect me, Swoops,” Kent says. 

“Yeah I know,” Swoops says, “Just, like I said, you look rattled, need anything?”

Kent sighs, “Can you grab Kelli? I need to get this shit off my face.” he gestures at the makeup. 

“Ah hold on,” Swoops reaches into his pocket and hands Kent a packet of disposable makeup wipes, Kent accepts them and starts unwrapping them, “For emergencies!” He says proudly.

“So like,” Swoops pulls up one of the deck chairs and sits across from Kent, “What’s up.”

“Nothing,” Kent says. 

“Parse,” Swoops warns. 

“I don’t know if you’d get it,” Kent finally says, “Man, I don’t know if I get it,” he sighs. 

“Try me,” Swoops says. 

“I’m weird, and fucked up and it doesn’t need to be your problem,” Kent runs the wipe under his eye. He says it aggressively hoping Swoops gets the memo to fuck off.

“I’ve said this before but, no, you’re fucking not.”

“No,” Kent says, “This is weird.”

Swoops shrugs. 

“It’s, I just  _ feel  _ weird,” he clenches the makeup wipe in his fist, “It’s just feelings it’s nothing serious or real or anything that matters even a little bit, it’s so fucking small.”

Swoops shrugs again. 

Kent shakes his head, words get stuck in his throat. 

“You can tell me anything. I like to think we’ve been friends long enough that I’ve proved that.”

Kent nods, “You have, I just… once I say it out loud it’s a  _ thing  _ and I don’t know if it should be.”

“If you wanna forget in the morning I can forget in the morning,” Swoops offers. 

Kent nods, there are almost tears welling in his eye,  _ almost.  _

“I don’t think I’m a guy,” Kent finally chokes out, a rush of air comes into his lungs he takes a deep breath and he feels like he has to get the next part out quick because Swoops is looking at him and Kent can see the gears turn in his head, “But I’m not a girl, but I’m also not  _ not  _ a girl and not  _ not  _ a guy and maybe this is dumb and I’m overthinking shit but it’s been a  _ thing  _ and I think I’ve felt like this for a long time. And maybe I’m overthinking it because guys paint their nails and guys want to wear makeup but I feel like I like it  _ too  _ much sometimes and that’s fucking terrifying and I don’t know what to do because it feels good but bad at the same time because I’m so afraid and then Whiskey calls me pretty and-” Kent chokes himself up, he feels tears hot against his cheeks, “And I just want to be pretty but not like a pretty boy, just pretty. I don’t want it to be funny.”

And he cries, he tries not to but the tears are overflowing. Swoops is quiet for a second. 

“Then you’re pretty,” he says. 

Kent looks up at him. 

“Parse, I don’t know a lot of stuff. This isn’t… we’re hockey players, I’m not like… a gender studies guy or anything. But it’s your life.”

“I don’t know what I want,” Kent says. 

“Can I ask questions?” Swoops says, he’s treading carefully. 

Kent shrugs, Swoops takes it as a yes.

“So like, you’re not a guy?” Swoops asks. 

“I am but I also am, at least a little bit,” Kent says, “If that makes sense.”

“Yeah, why not?” Swoops says, “And it’s the same about being a girl?”

Kent nods. 

“So what do you want to look like?” Swoops asks. 

Kent’s still trying to get the eyeliner off, it’s running now. 

“Like myself,” Kent says, “But… I don’t know,” Kent admits. 

“Okay, that’s fine,” Swoops says, “What about what I should call you?”

“Swoops, I don’t know,” Kent says, he feels vulnerable and helpless. 

“I can be more specific. You name? That’s fine right?”

“Yeah,” Kent says, because he can honestly say he’s never had a problem with his name. 

“So like, pronouns? It’s pronouns right? Like are you a _ he,  _ or a  _ she,  _ or like a  _ they _ ?” The fact that Swoops is trying so hard makes Kent cry even more. 

“All of them?” he says like it’s a question, he’s asking himself not Swoops, “Like…” he takes a deep breath, swallows some tears, “If you call me dude, it doesn’t make me upset, but then Kelli invites me over for girl’s night and I like that a lot and I know it’s supposed to be a joke but I don’t want it to be.”

“I can tell her that, I’m sure she’d-”

“No!” Kent cuts him off, “Don’t tell anyone, don’t even… like forget I ever said any of this, I’m drunk and it’s stupid and you don’t need to worry about it,” and then Kent is fully sobbing and he pulls his legs to his chest and he doesn’t even care that that’s not how dudes sit. 

“Parse,” Swoops says, “I can do that, we don’t have to talk about this, but I want you to know that this is fine, I’m okay with this. Not that it matters what I’m okay with,” Swoops adds quickly. 

Kent laughs dryly. 

“I think you should talk to someone,” Swoops says, “Like your therapist, Whiskey, talk to them.”

Kent nods, “Thanks man.”

“I will now develop amnesia and forget this ever happened.”

Swoops claps Kent on the back and Kent takes a breath. He also takes out his earrings and puts them in his pocket. He goes to bed like 20 minutes later. 

He does not, it turns out, talk to either Whiskey or his therapist about any of this. He wakes up and promptly and purposely forgets about it. Swoops, to his credit, doesn’t mention it at all when they’re cleaning up the mess the next morning. 

Whiskey comes to visit again. Kent plays a game on Friday so Whiskey promises to meet him after and Kelli promises to make sure that Whiskey finds the suite they’re going to be in. 

He’s feeling good, calm, cold, he and Swoops have downed their redbulls and he’s amped and ready to go, maybe a little bit eager to show off for his boyfriend, maybe a little bit more eager to get home afterwards. 

They win, it’s 5-4, they play sloppy defense, but it’s fun and they win and the standings don’t care as long as they won. 

Kent answers the questions from the press, he even grins at a few of the Aces beat reporters that he genuinely likes. 

“You know, a win’s a win,” Kent says, “We would have liked to play some better D but it is what it is and we’re just happy to get two points out of ‘er”

Kent showers and puts on his suit and meets Whiskey outside the dressing room. 

“I missed you,” Whiskey grins. 

“I missed you too,” Kent answers. 

Kent puts his arm around Whiskey’s shoulders in a way that can be easily construed as just bros. 

“Wanna get dinner?” Kent asks. 

“Yes please,” Whiskey answers. 

They get dinner and they go home and they have sex and then watch a movie. They wake up the next day and make breakfast and go to the gym and make a second breakfast and watch TV and then Whiskey has to go home. 

Kent doesn’t tell him. 

He feels just a little bit disconnected from Whiskey and he hates that he knows exactly why. He’s not lying but he feels like he is. He knows he doesn’t have to tell him any of this but he could. And Whiskey would try to understand, Kent knows he would, but he doesn’t want to ask him to. He doesn’t know how he can expect Whiskey to understand when he’s still not sure he understands himself. 

The nail polish stays in the box. He starts googling about eight different things and stops halfway through because he doesn’t want any of them in his search history. He thinks about letting his ear piercings close. Every time he talks to Whiskey, it feels just a little bit empty. He hangs up the phone every time feeling like he could have said something, like he should have, like he wanted to. But he never has the conversation. It’s fine, it’s his own shit, his own weird hang-up and his boyfriend has no obligation to try and fix it for him, that’s what he thinks. 

Whiskey spends Christmas with his family, Kent goes to Swoops and Kelli’s since he plays on the 27th and can’t really justify the flight to New York State to see his family. He’s secretly a little glad for the excuse. His mom can never tell what exactly is wrong with him, but she gives him this pitiful look that Kent hates when she knows something is up. He’s excited, he’s so excited for the day after Christmas, because that’s when Whiskey’s going to come see him. That’s the first day of their own Christmas vacation, and it’s not really a vacation because Kent still has games and practices, but he gets to be with Whiskey and that makes everything feel a little bit lighter. 

He forgets about the  _ thing,  _ he forgets about the nail polish in the back of his closet and the conversation he had with nSwoops on Halloween. He forgets about the way he felt when he wore those earrings for the very first time. He is hoodies and jeans and snapbacks and hockey and cardio and boys nights and it’s all  _ fine.  _

Everything feels so much better when Whiskey wraps his arms around him at the airport, holding on for just a little longer than friends should in public, Kent can’t even find it in himself to care. 

“I’m so happy to see you,” Whiskey says into the fabric of Kent’s sweater. 

Kent drives them home and they listen to Christmas music on the way even though Christmas was yesterday. Kent asks Whiskey about family dinner and Whiskey shrugs and says it went well enough and Kent says the same thing about dinner at Swoops’. 

“Did you cook?” Whiskey asks the second they step through Kent’s front door. 

Kent nods, the smell of the pot roast that he left in the slow cooker all day is filling the air and he’s suddenly a little bit worried that it’s going to be awful, but Whiskey breaks into a grin and drops his bag and takes a step forward and pulls Kent tight and close and kisses him full on the lips. 

Kent runs his fingers through the little curl at the back of Whiskey’s neck and kisses him back. 

“You can put your things in the bedroom,” Kent says, “Then dinner should be ready.”

“God you’re so fucking perfect,” Whiskey says. 

And Kent’s never not going to have the wind knocked out of him by Whiskey. By that look in his eyes. The idea that he’s perfect to someone, he doesn’t believe it, but Whiskey does and that’s breathtaking. 

Kent’s standing over a pot of mashed potatoes adding a little more garlic powder. He feels Whiskey’s hands wrapping around his waist, Whiskey’s breath is hot on his neck as he pecks a gentle kiss. Kent shudders. 

“It’s ready,” Kent says quietly. 

“It smells great,” Whiskey says. 

Kent’s already set the roast on the table along with some canned vegetables and the kind of bread rolls that he only ever sees around the holidays. 

Whiskey turns to the dining room table. Kent lit a candle because he’s lame and romantic like that. 

“You’re the most romantic person on the planet, you know that, right?” Whiskey asks. 

“For you,” Kent shrugs, “It’s always worth it.”

Whiskey relaxes his shoulders a little bit. He doesn’t resist wrapping Kent up in another kiss before they take the mashed potatoes to the table. 

Whiskey, for the record, would be just as happy if he had walked into Kent’s condo and there had been a McDonalds bag sitting on the dining room table. 

Whiskey tells Kent that everything is delicious, and he rests his hand on top of Kent’s for most of the meal and it makes Kent feel soft and warm and he almost cries because it feels so good to see Whiskey again, he doesn’t, he holds it together. 

“I’m going to do the dishes later,” Whiskey says, and before Kent can protest says, “It’s only fair. Not right now though.”

They clear the plates and sit in the living room, stuffed and happy and feeling festive and they turn on the Hallmark channel, the movie is already half finished but it doesn’t matter since all the movies are the same and Kent just wants to curl up against Whiskey’s chest. Whiskey plays with his hair, his fingers sliding over his scalp. Kent puts his hand in Whiskey’s free-hand and they stay there until the movie’s done. 

“Can I give you my present?” Kent asks. 

“Only if I can give you mine,” Whiskey answers. 

So Kent runs to the bedroom and Whiskey digs through his backpack and they meet up in the living room. Kent very deliberately does not move the pile of sweaters that’s covering the box of nail polish in his closet. Now is not the time. 

Kent makes Whiskey open his present first. The first gift is a maroon sweater, the kind that Whiskey likes to wear. It’s soft and Kent thinks the colour would look good on him and he’s always saying that he needs warmer sweaters for the Massachusetts winters. The second gift is in an envelope, a pair of Boston Celtics tickets that line up with the all star game break. They’re not just the tickets, but the promise of a date as well. 

“I love it,” Whiskey runs his hand over the soft fabric of the sweater, it’s an entirely practical gift, something Kent knows Whiskey appreciates. 

“Okay, my turn,” Whiskey says. 

He hands Kent a gift bag from a jewelry store. 

“It’s not an engagement ring,” Whiskey quickly adds. 

Kent nods. He pulls out a long velvet box. It’s nice, pretty. Kent tries to erase the word pretty from his mind.

He opens it, pulls out a gold chain. 

Whiskey’s looking down at his hands, almost like he’s embarrassed. 

“I know you have a chain that you already wear for games, so you don’t have to wear this one, but I wanted to…” Whiskey points at a small circular pendant in the middle of the chain, “This part comes unclasped,” and Kent realizes that it’s a locket. 

Kent opens it. 

“Oh wow,” he says. He’s looking down at the teeniest tiniest possible picture of himself and Whiskey. It’s a selfie, he remembers taking it on what he now thinks of as their second date, skating on the pond at Samwell.. 

“Like I said you don’t have to wea-”

Kent lunges forward on the couch and hugs Whiskey. He’s a little bit misty eyes but he laughs anyway. 

“Of course, I’ll wear it,” he says. And to prove it, he unclasps the chain and clasps it around his neck. It fits perfectly, the pendant is small enough that it doesn’t bother him. 

“It looks good,” Whiskey says. 

“I feel dumb just getting you a sweater now,” Kent says. 

Whiskey shakes his head, “I love the sweater, I love it because you gave it to me.”

Kent’s brushing his teeth later that night, getting ready to go to bed. He still has the locket hanging against his bare chest. He just keeps looking at it. He doesn’t even notice Whiskey sneaking up behind him. Kent jumps, it startles Whiskey. 

“Are you okay?” Whiskey asks. 

“Yep!” Kent says, almost too insistently. 

Whiskey raises his eyebrow, puts his head on Kent’s shoulder and wraps both arms around Kent’s torso. 

“You can tell me anything, you know that right?” Whiskey says and then he kisses the back of Kent’s shoulder. 

Kent nods wordlessly as the strange sort of guilt he’s been feeling sets in. 

“I know,” he says and sets down his toothbrush. 

He still doesn’t say anything. 


	3. Gave me the blues and then purple pink skies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Whiskey and Kent go to the team New Year's Party, Kent reaches a breaking point

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> have some whiskey POV that i have not proofread even once at this hour of 5am

“Hey babe?” Whiskey asks the next morning. 

“Yeah?” Kent says, sleep still in his eyes. 

“I was in the closet grabbing a sweater,” Whiskey says, “and I stepped in something wet, so I looked down and there was this box,” he’s treading lightly. 

“Oh,” Kent says, plausible deniability. 

“Yeah I think it was nail polish, like it leaked on the floor, I cleaned it up but the carpet might be a little stained.”

“Oh shit,” Kent says, he has to think of a lie quickly, “Oh yeah, I was going to give it to my sister for her birthday,” he laughs, “I guess I forgot.”

“Okay,” Whiskey says. Kent doesn’t know if he believes him, that’s a horrifying idea, “It’d be fine if you bought it for you, you know that right?” Whiskey asks. 

“Psh, yeah,” Kent laughs it off, “It’s not though.” 

Whiskey studies him for a second, shakes his head and changes the subject, “What do you want for breakfast?”

“Game day, so the usual,” Kent shrugs. 

Whiskey nods, “Let me bring it to you in bed,” he kisses the top of Kent’s head. 

“You don’t have to do that,” Kent rolls his eyes. 

“Shut up,” Whiskey says, “You’re going to let me be nice to you and you’re gonna like it,” he sticks his tongue out. 

Whiskey gets off the bed and Kent hears him bustling in the kitchen making eggs.

He has exactly enough time to start panicking about the idea of Whiskey finding out what he feels like is a shameful secret. He looks down at the necklace around his neck and unclasps it, he turns it over in his hand, the gold, the pendant. He wants to wear it, and yet, he’s wary of it. 

Whiskey walks back into the bedroom with two plates, Kent doesn’t notice at first, he still has the necklace in his hand. 

“You took it off?” Whiskey asks. 

“Oh!” Kent startles, “I’m gonna put it back on.”

“Good,” Whiskey says, “You look pretty in gold,” he hands Kent his breakfast and Kent’s stomach twists and he doesn’t know how he’s going to swallow his food. 

He does it though, because when he’s chewing, Whiskey doesn’t expect him to talk. But he needs to talk, so he talks. 

“Why do you call me that?” Kent blurts out. 

Whiskey carefully sets down his toast, “Call you what?”

“Pretty,” Kent mumbles. 

“Because you are,” Whiskey says, “and I thought you liked it.”

“I do,” Kent says, “I think I do, just… why? It’s not… I dunno. Guys don’t call each other pretty.”

“Do you want me to stop?” Whiskey asks. 

“No,” Kent groans, he runs his hands through his hair. 

“I don’t know what you’re asking,” Whiskey says. 

“I don’t know what I’m saying,” Kent admits. 

“Can you maybe try to explain?”

“It’s dumb,” Kent starts, “The nail polish was mine,” he says, “I bought it and then I threw it in the closet.”

“Why?”

Kent tries to back out, “Don’t worry about it, it’s dumb. I’m fine.”

“Baby,” Whiskey sighs and puts his head on Kent’s shoulder.

“I don’t know what I’m saying,” Kent says, “Breakfast looks great, can we just eat?”

Whiskey nods but he looks at Kent a little bit quizzically. Kent hates that. 

But the thing is, he kind of  _ wants  _ Whiskey to look at him differently, a little bit at least, but how can he possibly say that? How does that possibly make sense?

So Kent doesn’t say it. 

Whiskey stays for the rest of his holiday break. He looks after Kit while Kent travels for the away games. He holes up in the living room with his textbooks, books on the table, sitting on the floor. Kent’s going to be gone for the entire day, but he’ll be home for New Years Eve. He’s reading an article about business communication in the textbook he spent way too much money on and he can’t focus. He reads a sentence three times without actually absorbing what it means and then he gives up. Kit crawls into his lap, nuzzles against his arm until he scratches the top of her head. 

“Hi sweetheart,” he whispers. 

He sighs, looks up at Kent’s TV, there’s a golf tournament on ESPN. 

“I wish you could tell me what’s going on with him,” Whiskey says softly. 

Kit’s unbothered, headbutts him and purrs. 

Whiskey wouldn’t say he’s overwhelmed, this fine and it’s very clearly a problem in Kent’s head, a problem that exists to him and only him and that he won’t tell Whiskey about. The nail polish and the necklace and the way he seemed to panic when Whiskey called Kent pretty the other morning. He doesn’t know what to make of it, he doesn’t know how. 

But he loves Kent and he knows he loves Kent, he can know that. 

His laptop is open in front of him. He opens a new YouTube tab.  _ Nail Tutorials.  _ He clicks on a video of a young looking girl holding out what looks like a bottle of nail polish. She starts the video by showing off the finished look. It has gemstones and clean lines and glitter. Whiskey closes the video, that’s a little bit out of his depth.  _ Nail Tutorials for beginners.  _

Whiskey spends the entire three hours that Kent’s game is on learning how to paint nails. He gets up before puck drop, picks up Kent’s box of nail polish and sets it down on the living room table. He tests it out on himself, doesn’t bother doing his right hand because he knows he’ll screw it up. He’s careful, takes 10 minutes to do one nail, making sure that the polish doesn’t bleed out onto his skin. 

He doesn’t panic about it, if Kent walked in the living room right now, he doesn’t think he’d get as flustered as Kent had when he found the box in the closet. He doesn’t really like it, like he wouldn’t do this if there wasn’t a reason for it, if he wasn’t practicing to do Kent’s when he gets home. Kent gets an assist on one of Swoops’ goals and Whiskey sends him a one handed text of congratulations. 

Whiskey looks at his left hand, admires his handiwork, he thinks he did a pretty good job but he sends it to foxtrot for a review. He painted the nails dark blue and added the polka dot details in red. She answers withing seconds. 

**Foxtrot:** **is that ur hand**

 **Whiskey:** **yeah**

 **Foxtrot:** **who did it?**

 **Whiskey:** **me, i’m not incompetent**

 **Whiskey:** **i’m trying to learn how**

 **Foxtrot:** **it looks pretty good, i would have picked a brighter colour for the polka dots, but otherwise it’s solid**

 **Whiskey:** **duly noted**

 **Foxtrot:** **not that it’s weird or anything**

 **Foxtrot:** **but it’s a little weird**

 **Foxtrot:** **you have like 5 versions of the same pair of khakis i wouldn’t peg you for a nail polish guy**

 **Whiskey:** **can i swear you to secrecy**

 **Foxtrot:** **of course**

 **Whiskey:** **kent bought a bunch of nail polish a while ago and when i found the box he seemed kind of spooked by it, so I don’t know if he thinks i think it’s weird or what. But i just want him to know that it’s chill so like, i watched some youtube videos**

 **Foxtrot:** **fuck u that’s adorable**

 **Whiskey:** **not a big deal**

 **Foxtrot:** **does this have something to do with the time you barged into my room at 8am demanding nail polish remover**

 **Whiskey:** **long story short, yeah**

 **Foxtrot:** **cool**

 **Whiskey:** **I don’t really care for it on my own hand, but I think it’s a thing for Kent**

 **Foxtrot:** **What kind of thing?**

 **Whiskey:** **not sure.**

Kent walks into the condo and drops his bags on the floor, it’s nearly 4 in the morning and he just wants to go to bed, he’ll unpack in the morning. He finds Whiskey already fast asleep in bed and smiles, there’s nothing better than coming home to this, he thinks. He lifts the covers and snuggles up against Whiskey’s chest. Whiskey readjusts, puts his arm protectively over Kent’s chest. Kent puts his hand on Whiskey’s. That’s when Kent sees the nail polish, dark blue with red polka dots. He closes his eyes and goes to sleep. It’s too early in the morning for a breakdown.

He brings it up over breakfast, notices how Whiskey doesn’t have his right hand painted. He yawns, sits down at the table with a bowl of instant oats. 

“So uhhh,” he gestures to Whiskey’s hand. 

Whiskey looks down and shrugs, it’s not a big deal to him. Kent wishes he felt that way. 

“I was watching a YouTube video and I wanted to try it out.”

“Cool,” Kent says and then he shoves the spoon in his mouth effectively ending the conversation. 

“The videos are cool,” Whiskey says. 

“Hey, can I do your nails?” Whiskey asks. 

“Um,” Kent says. He’s sitting in the living room after dinner on New Years Eve. 

Whiskey sits down on the couch next to him, “I watched a video about working with those little gems and things and I want to see if I can get the hang of it and it’s too hard to do on myself.”

Kent bites down on his lip, Whiskey got a new hobby. That’s cool, he’ll support it, he definitely doesn’t suspect any ulterior motive. 

“It’s our anniversary tomorrow,” Whiskey says halfway through applying the base coat to Kent’s left hand. 

“I thought our anniversary was in November.”

“That’s the anniversary of our first date,” Whiskey says, “I asked you to be my boyfriend on New Years Day, last year.”

“I still maintain that our anniversary was that day I kissed you at Samwell,” this does not change the fact that Kent has dinner reservations and a bottle of champagne stashed away for tomorrow night. 

“No, I’m definitely right,” Whiskey says. 

Kent leans over, “How do you know where you’ve already painted, it’s clear,” he says. 

“I can kind of feel where it’s wet and not wet,” Whiskey shrugs. 

“Here, you try,” he hands Kent the bottle of base coat. Kent drags it over his middle finger. Every other time he’s painted his nails, he’s kind of zoned out, his hands went a little numb every time before now. But he lets himself feel it, and he notices, he can feel the polish on his nails, just a little bit heavier, it’s a miniscule but perceptible difference. 

He nods, hands the polish back to Whiskey, “You’re better at this than I am,” he mumbles. 

“It’s easier when you’re not doing it yourself,” Whiskey says.

His hands are so steady and his gaze is so intense, so serious, that it reassures Kent just a little bit. He doesn’t feel stupid for liking this. 

“I think you have good hands for this,” Whiskey says. 

Kent’s chest does a happy little twist, maybe because Whiskey seems to know what he’s doing, maybe something else. 

It takes nearly an hour, Whiskey does a base coat and then a layer of black matte nail polish and then he glues golden rhinestones around the cuticle of Kent’s middle finger. 

“Wow,” Kent says when Whiskey finishes. 

“Do you like it?” Whiskey asks. 

Kent just nods, a little speechless. 

“I’m glad.”

“If I keep it on…” Kent mumbles, “Would you be okay with that?”

“Yeah,” Whiskey says, “I think you should.”

He interlaces their fingers, Whiskey has long since picked his own nail polish off. Kent likes how their hands look together. He wiggles his fingers, buries his head in the fabric of Whiskey’s shirt. 

“It’s a cool hobby,” Whiskey shrugs, “I like it. Maybe I’ll do Ford’s when I go back to Samwell.”

Kent nods, “But not your own?”

Whiskey shrugs, “It’s not my thing, I dunno,” Whiskey says. 

“I like it,” Kent says, “That you did it and that it looks… nice,” Kent says. 

“What would you think if I grew my hair out?” Kent asks while he’s doing up the buttons on his dress shirt.

“Yeah,” Whiskey says, “Why not? It’d look good. Rachel taught me how to do french braids, I could practice on you.”

Kent looks happy while he helps Swoops put up golden streamers. 

“I dig the nails, bud,” Whiskey overhears Swoops say, he smiles softly to himself as he pours some queso into a bowl while Kelli opens the tortilla chips. 

“What?” Kent sounds startled, Whiskey frowns, “Oh uh,” Kent continues. 

“Looks good,” Swoops cuts off Kent’s rambling. 

“Thanks,” Kent mumbles. 

Whiskey sets the snacks on the table, threads his arm around Kent’s waist and kisses him on the cheek. Swoops is still on a step-ladder taping balloons to the ceiling. 

Kent has both of his hands in his pockets, only slips one out to wrap his arm around Whiskey and squeeze him tight. 

Whiskey can’t help but get romantic about it, to get nostalgic. It’s been a year, almost a year to the day, to the hour, to the minute. A year ago, they got home from this party, with these friends, and they fell asleep on the couch and Whiskey told Kent that he wanted this to be a  _ thing.  _ And everything’s the same but so much has changed. He can tell Kent he loves him now, he has a future to fantasize about. He looks at Kent and he’s the same but he’s also different. Whiskey loves him so much and he knows that there’s something going on and he doesn’t know the right words or what to do exactly but he knows that he loves him, and that has to be enough, he can make that into enough. 

Kent kisses Whiskey on the cheek, kisses him with an easy grin on his face. Whiskey pulls him closer in a quick motion, puts both of his hands on either side of Kent’s face. He looks at him for just a second. His eyes are green in the light of the condo and his lips are slightly parted in surprise. Whiskey doesn’t wait a second longer to kiss him, standing right there in the living room. Kent makes a little surprised noise that dies in the back of his throat. 

“What was that for?” Kent asks.

“In case we don’t get a New Year’s kiss like last year,” Whiskey says. 

“You’re such a romantic motherfucker,” Kent says. 

“Yeah,” Whiskey shrugs. 

“Whiskey!” Swoops shouts, “Stop being such a wife guy and help me move this speaker.”

“Wife guy?” Whiskey raises an eyebrow, he notices a blush creep up Kent’s neck, “You can do better than that.”

Swoops rolls his eyes and Whiskey helps him move on of the speakers to the other side of the room. 

Kent does another shot before people start showing up, Whiskey doesn’t think anything of it, it’s a party. It’s dark in the apartment other than the LED lights that they have hanging around the ceiling. 

Whiskey gets introduced to some of the rookies, recognizes one of them as having played for Michigan last year so he strikes up a conversation about college hockey. He likes to think he’s getting better at parties, talking to people in places like this. It helps that he keeps his alcohol consumption to a minimum, feels in control the whole time. 

He looks over at the beer pong table. 

“Let’s play,” the guy from Michigan says. 

“Yeah, cool,” Whiskey agrees and they play a round against Scraps and a defenseman who Whiskey’s never met before. 

He looks around for Kent, he saw him dancing with one of the WAGs a couple minutes ago. Whiskey doesn’t need to be by Kent’s side all the time, in fact he’s actively avoiding it, but he likes to keep tabs, to know that he can shoot him a look if he ever needs to find an excuse to get out of a conversation. 

“How do you know Parser?” Michigan asks. 

“Samwell, he was friends with Jack Zimmermann, small world,” Whiskey shrugs. 

Michigan nods, then looks puzzled for a second, “Didn’t Zimmermann graduate before you even showed up?”

_ Shit _ , that’s usually a good enough story. Whiskey stammers, “Uh, yeah, but uh, y’know he still kept in touch. And uh, followed the NCAA and uh, well. Y’know, just started talking. Good guy.”

“Right,” Michigan says, “I definitely wish there were NHL players who just hung around my team.”

“Ha, lucky I guess,” Whiskey sinks the ping pong ball in the final cup. He high fives Michigan. 

“You wanna go again?” Michigan asks. 

“I’m gonna grab another drink instead,” Whiskey says, “Maybe later.”

And he smiles, and he actually means it and he walks into the kitchen feeling just a little bit proud of himself for doing more than just standing against the wall with a cup in his hand. 

He fills a cup up with water. There are a couple girls standing in the corner giggling, one guy is sitting on the floor eating shrimp off of a cocktail plate, his shirt all the way unbuttoned. It’s not quite a kegster because he knows the shrimp won’t give anyone food poisoning and no one’s allowed to smoke weed inside, but the energy is similar. 

_ Kent,  _ like a solid 60 per cent of Whiskey’s thoughts revolve around his boyfriend, but the number gets way higher when they’re together and he’s a little tipsy.

Kelli’s standing next to Swoops holding a can of twisted tea, Whiskey taps her on the shoulder. 

“You seen Kent around?” he asks. 

“He said he wasn’t feeling well,” Kelli has to shout for Whiskey to hear him, “He went to lie down, he’s in the guest bedroom.”

“Not feeling well?”

Kelli shrugs, “I think he threw up earlier.”

“God, why didn’t someone come get me,” Whiskey mutters. 

“Huh?” Kelli shouts. 

“I’m gonna go check on him,” Whiskey shouts. 

Kelli nods. 

The door is locked when Whiskey tries to open it, which is fair all things considered. Whiskey knocks, gently since it’s not as loud. 

“I’m good!” Kent shouts from the other side of the door. 

“Kent, it’s me!” Whiskey shouts back, “Can I come in?”

“I said I’m good,” Kent answers again. Okay, now Whiskey’s a little worried, Kent’s slurring at the end of his sentences. 

He knows that the locks on the guest bedrooms aren’t deadbolts, just the kind that stop the doorknob from turning. 

“Kent,” Whiskey lowers his voice, “I just want to make sure you’re okay.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Kent says, “Jus go have fun, don’t worry about me.”

Whiskey sighs. He hates to do this. He pulls his own keys out of his pocket and uses them to pop the lock on the door. He opens it a crack, “I’m coming in,” he says. 

He opens the door all the way, closes it and re-locks it behind him. Kent’s lying on top of a fully made bed, legs splayed out in front of him, arms crossed over his chest. 

“Think I’ve got the spins,” Kent mumbles. 

Whiskey sits on the edge of the bed. He puts his hand on top of Kent’s thigh. 

“Kelli said you threw up?”

“Not my finest moment,” Kent smirks. 

“How much did you drink?”

Kent squeezes his eyes shut, “The vodka started going down like water.”

“So way too much?” Whiskey smirks. 

Kent nods. 

Whiskey runs his hand over Kent’s browbone, pets his hair gently and sighs. 

He kicks his shoes off and lays down next to him. Kent moves over so that there’s more room on the pillow for him. 

“Did you at least have fun?” Whiskey asks. 

Kent shakes his head. 

Whiskey feels his brow furrowing, he pets Kent’s hair as he asks, “What’s wrong.”

“Feel weird,” Kent mumbles, his eyes are closed.

“I can get water, and there’s definitely advil somewhere around here.”

“Not like that,” Kent says. 

“I don’t know what you’re saying,” Whiskey says. 

“Like  _ I’m  _ weird,” Kent says,”

Whiskey doesn’t know what to say, he moves closer to Kent, drapes his arm over Kent and squeezes tight. Kent smells like vodka.

“Can you talk about it,” Whiskey whispers. 

Kent squeezes his eyes shut even tighter, like something is starting to hurt and he shakes his head. He rolls over, facing away from Whiskey.

“No _ , _ ” Kent says. 

Whiskey sits up, he puts his hand on Kent’s shoulder, Kent shrugs him away. Kent sits up, he reaches over to the nightstand. Whiskey notices the red solo cup for the first time, Kent picks it up and takes a sip. 

“Are you sure you want to keep drinking?”

Kent shrugs Whiskey off again.

“Just never mind,” Kent says. 

“There’s something going on,” Whiskey says, “Whatever’s bothering you, we can talk about it,” Whiskey says. 

“I-” Kent starts, “No,” he finishes. 

“You’re being weird,” Whiskey says. 

Kent clenches his jaw, “No shit.”

Whiskey moves to sit next to Kent, he puts his hand on Kent’s thigh and this time Kent doesn’t swat him away. 

“You don’t have to do this,” Kent says. 

He takes a long sip of whatever’s in his cup. 

“I love you,” Whiskey says. 

“Whatever,” Kent stands up. 

Whiskey watches as Kent finishes his drink. He flops down onto the floor. He watches Kent turn the cup in his hands. He’s fixated on something, and then Whiskey sees it, he’s looking at his nails. Kent exhales shakily and then he starts picking it off. 

“What are you doing,” Whiskey says, still sitting on the edge of the bed. 

“Stupid,” Kent mutters. 

It won’t come off by just picking it so he starts trying to bite it off, scraping at it with his teeth. 

“Kent,” Whiskey says. 

“What!” Kent snaps. 

“I thought you like it,” Whiskey’s voice is small. 

Kent shakes his head. 

“Did I do it wrong?” Whiskey asks. 

Kent shakes his head, he gets most of the polish off of his thumb. 

“It’s not you!” Kent snaps again, he’s not quite shouting, but the energy is there, “You didn’t do anything, okay? Just leave it. It’s dumb to want.”

“I like it,” Whiskey says. 

“You’re just saying that.”

“You look nice. It’s pretty,” Whiskey says. 

Kent shakes his head. 

“You  _ are _ , you’re so pretty,” Whiskey slides off the bed to sit across from Kent. Kent doesn’t look up at him. 

“I want to be,” Kent mumbles. 

“You are.”

“Don’t lie,” Kent says, “Kelli is pretty and Ford is pretty and Ford’s rugby girlfriend is pretty and handsome at the same time and I just… I want to be that. I want to be pretty that way and I’m not, okay? I’m just not.”

Whiskey reaches for Kent’s hand, Kent snaps away, peels the polish off of his index finger. 

Kent’s choking up as he speaks, “The nail polish and the glitter and… I dunno. I don’t know what I want! But I know that what I do want is so fucking scary and I  _ can’t  _ have it. It’s not for me. I’m…. It’s fucked up. I’m- Just,” he clenches his fist again, shakes his head, “I don’t know, okay? I’m… I don’t feel like a girl but I don’t feel like a dude and-” Kent’s face drops, he looks like he’s about to panic, he steels his face, clenches his jaw and shakes his head, “I’m fine, it’ll pass, it always does,” he says. 

“We can talk about this,” Whiskey says. 

“No,” Kent answers. 

“I-” Whiskey says.

Kent cuts him off, “Just leave me alone, go back to the party, okay, I’m gonna get a cab and go home,” Kent says. 

“I’ll come with you,” Whiskey says. 

“No,” Kent says and it’s firm, “Leave me alone.”

And then Kent walks out of the room and Whiskey thinks he should follow him, grab his arm and stop him and tell him he loves him no matter what, and they’ll be okay. And Everything will be okay because Whiskey loves Kent. He doesn’t get up. He just watches as Kent slips away before midnight. Whiskey doesn’t follow. 

He goes back to the party and does his best to pretend everything is fine. Everyone is too drunk to notice Kent’s departure. He plays another round of beer pong with Michigan and they watch the ball drop on TV. 

Swoops pulls him aside after midnight, he’s shitfaced. 

“Yooooo where’s Parser,” he slurs. 

“Went home,” Whiskey mumbles. 

“Ohhhh fuck, is he okay?”

Whiskey shrugs. 

“Did you guys fight?” Swoops lowers his voice. 

“Kind of,” Whiskey mumbles, he bites his lip, “Has he ever mentioned…” Whiskey trails off, “I don’t know what I’m talking about, but like… has he ever mentioned, like. Not feeling like a dude.”

“Oh shit,” Swoops’ voice drops again, “Fuck,” Swoops says, “He told me he was going to talk to you.”

Swoops pulls him outside. He closes the door behind him. And Swoops tells Whiskey about Halloween, Kent freaking out about wearing makeup, how he’d looked so happy at first but then second guessed himself, and fuck, that sounds like how he got about the nail polish. 

“I told him I wouldn’t tell anybody because, well, duh,” Swoops says, “It’s his own shit, but he said he’d talk to you.”

“Well he didn’t.”

“Fuck, that was in October, that’s a long time to keep that to himself.”

Whiskey nods, then he has a thought, “Should we even be saying… like  _ him,  _ is that… I really don’t know how this works.”

Swoops shrugs, “If he hasn’t told you any different.”

“Right,” Whiskey says, “Yeah that’s probably.”

He sighs, runs his hands through his hair. 

“He seemed pissed,” Whiskey says, “When he left, like he was mad at me for bringing it up.”

“Yeah,” Swoops says, “He gets like that sometimes, don’t take it personal.”

Whiskey nods, “I thought that’s kind of what it was.”

“He’ll feel really shitty about it and apologize, it’s up to you whether you accept it, but he’ll mean it,” Swoops says, “He uh, when he feels vulnerable he kind of shuts down and he tries to push you away. He’ll say all kinds of shit he wouldn’t say otherwise to get you to hate him. I think he thinks he deserves to be hated.”

“Christ,” Whiskey says.

“He’s been better since you two got together,” Swoops says. 

Whiskey nods. 

“Give him some space to cool off, that usually works,” Swoops says. 

Whiskey nods. 

“Crash in the guest bedroom.”

Whiskey nods again. 

Swoops stands up and claps him on the shoulder, “He loves you,” he says it like it’s an abject fact. The same way he would say, “the sky is blue.”

Whiskey smiles to himself. 

“I uh,” Swoops starts, “I’ve seen him make a lot of not great decisions when it comes to uh, guys and dating and shit,” he looks down, then back up at Whiskey, “I was worried at first when he started talking about you. He’s my best friend, y’know, and no offense but you can kind of seem like a douchebag to anyone who doesn’t know you, no offense.”

“None taken.”

“But the point is,” Swoops continues, “You really care about him. All of him, like, you care about this stuff too,” he shrugs, “I dunno. Thanks.”

“Don’t thank me,” Whiskey shakes his head, “It’s not hard, not hard to love him.”

“Soft,” Swoops snorts. 

“As fuck,” Whiskey nods. 

“The guest bedroom is all yours.”

Whiskey nods. He goes to sleep a while later, while Swoops and some of the other Aces are still playing cards in the living room. 

Swoops and Kelli are still asleep when he leaves in the morning. He finds Kent’s keys on the floor and drives home. He doesn’t know what he’ll say when he gets there, holds his breath for the entire drive. 

The lights are off when he gets home and Kent’s jacket is on the floor. He walks quietly down the hallway to the bedroom. The door is open a crack. He sees Kent lying under the covers. He’s stripped down to his boxers, clothes still on the floor next to the bed, left in a pile like he only really does when he’s drunk. He’s snoring heavily. Whiskey walks in, Kent doesn’t stir. It’s still early. Whiskey finds a pair of sweatpants and hoodie and changes in the bathroom. Kent still doesn’t stir. 

He finds Kit in the kitchen. Kent remembered to fill her water dish before he went to bed, but Whiskey takes the time to pull a can of wet food from the cupboard and puts it into her dish. She pounces. He scratches her between the ears. 

Whenever Whiskey’s overwhelmed, he just goes, he has to do something, has to move. It’s why he trains so hard. So he makes breakfast. Whiskey isn’t a good cook, not even a little bit. Kent always cooks dinner, and usually breakfast when they’re together. But any idiot can manage breakfast. 

Kent likes pancakes and he loves waffles, but what he loves more is staying on track when it comes to his diet during the season, so Whiskey gets out the eggs and a package of turkey bacon. He puts on a pot of coffee and lays the strips of bacon in a frying pan. They start to sizzle and pop because he has the heat up too high. He reaches to turn it down. He puts some olive oil into the frying pan once he finishes the bacon. He throws a massive handful of spinach into the pan along with some minced garlic, and honestly he feels pretty good about it. Something about minced garlic and olive oil makes him feel like he knows what he’s doing. 

He hears footsteps, he feels Kent’s presence watching him. Kent clears his throat. 

“Good morning,” Kent says, his voice is still hoarse. 

“Morning,” Whiskey says, a small smile on his face. 

Kent’s looking down at the floor, his hands are balled up inside of the sweater he must have put on before he left the bedroom. He’s still wearing the black boxers he’d been wearing in bed. 

“How do you want your eggs?” Whiskey asks.

“Fried is good,” Kent says. 

Whiskey cracks three eggs into the pan for each of them. 

“It smells good,” Kent says quietly. 

“It’s just garlic,” Whiskey shrugs. Once the toast is done, he moves it onto their plates and puts the eggs on top.

Kent has to take his hands out of his pockets when Whiskey hands him his plate. They sit down at the table. Kent is quiet, he’s retreated somewhere, hasn’t kissed Whiskey good morning yet, hasn’t said anything without Whiskey asking him a question first. Whiskey watches as Kent pokes at his breakfast. 

“It’s good,” he says after his first bite of spinach. 

“Thanks,” Whiskey says. 

Kent pokes the yolk of his egg and takes a bite.

“So about last night,” Whiskey starts. 

“I’m all good Kent says,” quickly, dismissively.

“Really?” Whiskey asks ”,You uh, you said some stuff last night and you seemed pretty upset.”

“Yeah, well, I drank a lot, so,” Kent just shrugs, “I don’t even really remember.”

“I don’t believe that,” Whiskey says.

Kent’s holding his fork tight in his hand. 

“Told you I’m fine,” Kent says. 

“There’s something you’re not telling me,” Whiskey says, “It’s not… you don’t have to worry about what I think.”

“I’m fine.”

Whiskey shakes his head, “baby,” he says, “You’re just so” he tries to choose words carefully, “On edge”

Kent’s clenching his fork but he isn’t eating.

“I’m sorry I was a dick,” Kent says. 

“You were,” Whiskey says, “And I’m not going to lie and say that you didn’t hurt my feelings, but that’s not what I’m worried about right now. I just want you to tell me what’s going on.”

“I was pushing you away. I’m sorry. You don’t have to forgive me. I was being an asshole.”

“That’s not what I mean. I mean, you were, but that’s not what I care about. You just, what you said. I want to know what you mean.”

“What if I don’t know what I mean,” Kent mutters. 

Whiskey doesn’t answer, “You told me you wanted to be  _ actually  _ pretty, like Kelli and Ford and Ford’s ex-girlfriend.”

It feels like the air gets sucked out of the room.He waits. Kent shoves a forkful of spinach in his mouth. Sets his fork down, drinks his coffee. He starts to talk, he stops. He sighs. He takes another bite. He looks at Whiskey with something in his eyes, a mix of fear and some strange kind of hope. He clears his throat.

“I don’t know if I’m like, all the way a dude.”

Whiskey feels the exhale.

Whiskey just nods. 

“It’s this feeling in my chest and it’s-” he cuts himself off, “It’s so dumb,” Kent says. 

“I don’t think you’re dumb,” Whiskey says quickly. 

“It’s all of it, the nail polish and you calling me pretty and,” he swallows, “I uh,” he takes a deep breath

“Yeah, you mentioned that last night. We can talk about it.”

“Yeah,” Kent says, “I don’t know how. I’m trying.”

Whiskey reaches over and squeezes his hand. 

“I know that guys can wear makeup and skirts and shit and that doesn’t make them… not guys. But it just feels different. Like, when you painted your nails,” Kent says, “How did that feel?”

Whiskey shrugs, “A little weird, just not my thing. It was neat though.”

“See,” Kent says, “When you painted my nails that first time, it felt fucking incredible. I couldn’t stop looking at them and I wanted it to last forever and I felt fucking incredible. But I also felt scared shitless, and I think that’s kind of  _ because  _ it felt so good. Like I was scared of how much I liked it and-” he cuts himself off, “It’s dumb.”

Kent takes a long sip of his coffee.

“It’s not,” Whiskey says. 

“Like I guess maybe I thought it was just… Like I’m gay. That’s a thing, we know that. It took a while but I’m cool with it and I guess I always thought that if I was lowkey about it, it’d be fine. Like if I didn’t like makeup and I was super masc, no one would know and if people did know they’d think I was like, one of the good ones or something,” Kent sighs, “But then I… This is weird.”

“Okay,” Whiskey says, “I’d be lying if I said I know anything about this, but I love you, dude all the way or not.”

That makes Kent chuckle and Whiskey rejoices. 

“There are some days,” Kent says, “Some days where I don’t feel it and some days where I think I float in the middle I think. I don’t know”

Whiskey nods. 

Kent runs his hands through his hair, “I wish I’d never started thinking about it,” he says. 

“When did you start thinking about it?” Whiskey asks. 

“I don’t really know,” Kent says, “But uh, I guess the first time I remember feeling this way. Excited and scared at the same time, y’know? That feeling in my chest. I guess I was 16, when we pierced my ears and I just kept looking at them and I couldn’t stop thinking about the way they made me look and I couldn’t stop thinking that maybe I was pretty and maybe someone else would think I was pretty. I remember, it’s uh. When I was with Jack, I asked him what he thought and he told me they were kind of weird and I just remember, all I wanted was for him to think I was pretty. I just wanted him to see what… I guess I wanted him to see how I felt inside. That’s lame”

Whiskey shakes his head.

Whiskey’s heart wrenches in his chest, because if the first time Kent ever felt like this was that long ago, then he’s been holding on to this for so long.

Kent must notice Whiskey’s reaction because he quickly adds, “I didn’t put it together. Not until this year, but there were definitely… things. Moments where I probably could have figured it out.”

and  _ fuck,  _ Whiskey has to ask questions now and he just knows he’ll trip over his tongue. 

“What does this mean in terms of me,” Whiskey asks and then clarifies, “Like what can I do.”

“You don’t have to…” Kent says, “It doesn’t need to be-”

Whiskey cuts him off, “No, but I love you and I want to know.”

“Uh,” Kent says, “I really don’t know. I uh, told Swoops on Halloween about some of it and he asked about things like,  _ hes  _ and  _ shes  _ and  _ theys  _ and stuff and I told him everything was fine with me and I think that’s right. But obviously, just stick with  _ he  _ because… hockey.”

Right. It hangs over so much of Kent’s life, of course it hangs over this. 

“I uh, liked it just now when you said we were partners. That’s nice, but  _ boyfriend  _ is still fine.”

“What about  _ girlfriend _ ?” Whiskey asks. 

“I don’t want you to force anything,” Kent shakes his head. 

“What if I say it and you see how you feel.”

Kent hunches his shoulders, he sinks into his sweater but he nods. 

“My girlfriend, Kent,” Whiskey says. 

Kent smiles, “I uh, I don’t hate it.”

“My partner, Kent?” Whiskey asks. 

And Kent smiles, small again, his eyes cast downward. 

“Kind of sounds like we’re starting a law firm together,” Kent laughs. 

Whiskey chuckles. 

“When I was in the Q, the guys used to tease me. They’d chirp me, saying I was Jack’s wife and shit, and I remember thinking that was kind of funny. But I think it’d also be funny if they said I was his husband. Like both just felt weird and not quite right.”

Kent’s finally talking and Whiskey wants him to keep going, so he puts his hand on top of Kent’s and squeezes. 

“And when you call me pretty, I guess it just feels like… It feels like you’re seeing me. I’ve never felt like it was a joke, you know? And when I get chirped it’s always  _ pretty boy,  _ but with you it’s just pretty and that feels good.”

“You are pretty.”

“It feels like you’re seein’ me, I uh, I guess,” Kent says, “I always feel like you see me.”

Whiskey takes a shaky breath. 

“Is this… a lot?” Kent asks. 

“No, not that at all,” Whiskey says, “I just… the fact that you trust me enough with something like this, that’s good,” he mumbles. 

“I’m sorry, “ Kent says, “I didn’t mean…like, it’s our anniversary and we were supposed to have fun on New Years Eve and I fucked it up.”

Whiskey shakes his head, “You think our anniversary is in November anyway,” he waves him off. 

He sees tears welling up in Kent’s eyes. 

“Oh shit,” Whiskey says, “I didn’t mean to.”

“No,” Kent says, “I just, can I please hug you?” 

They both stand up, Kent surges forward, throwing himself into Whiskey’s arms. He squeezes, putting his arms around Kent’s shoulders and holding him there and Kent’s head sinks into Whiskey’s shoulder. 

“I don’t know what I’d do without you,” Kent whispers. 

Whiskey puts one hand on the back of Kent’s head and runs his fingers through his hair.

“So, today’s our anniversary, because last year I asked you to be my boyfriend on New Years Day. So can I ask you to be my girlfriend too.”

Kent pulls back and looks up at Whiskey, he’s laughing but he’s grinning too and there’s a twinkle in his eye that tells Whiskey that it was the exact right thing to say. And he loves that look. He takes Kent’s hand and holds it up between them. The nail polish looks ravaged and picked at and he can see where Kent tried to bite it off last night. 

Kent sighs. 

“It’s so… it’s scary, the idea that someone might see it and see me when I’m not ready for that.”

“I know,” Whiskey said, “I wish I could fight someone and make it cool for hockey boys to wear nail polish,” he says. 

Kent laughs, “Yeah.”

“I bet you could rock long hair, you talked about growing your hair out.”

“Yeah,” Kent says, “Maybe I could do that,” Kent says. 

“You don’t have to be afraid of me seeing you,” Whiskey says, “Will you be my partner too?” he asks. 

Kent laughs, “Yes,” he kisses Whiskey on the mouth, short and sweet. 

Whiskey spends the rest of the morning asking Kent to keep dating him with increasingly silly titles attached. 

“Will you be my significant other too?” he asks when they’re lying on the couch teasing Kit with a laser pointer. 

“Yes,” Kent laughs as Kit runs headfirst into the coffee table leg. 

“Will you be my lover?” Whiskey asks while Kent makes tofu scramble and pasta for lunch. 

Kent laughs, “That one’s definitely kind of weird, but yes.”

“Will you be my rock?” Whiskey asks in the afternoon.

“Your rock?” Kent snorts. 

“Yeah, like the thing that keeps me steady.”

“I make no guarantees about stability,” Kent jokes. 

They go out to dinner together and later that night when they’re lying next to each other in bed, Whiskey looks over at Kent’s hands and the chipped nailpolish. Without talking, he finds the nail polish remover and a cotton ball and starts gently wiping it off. Kent watches him intently. 

“Taking it off can be nice too,” Kent says. 

Whiskey nods. 

“You’re pretty either way, and handsome, and beautiful.” 

Whiskey kisses the top of his forehead.

Kent cries. And in his tears, he tells Whiskey that he thinks he doesn’t deserve it. That he’s being dumb and it doesn’t actually matter and it’s such a silly problem to have and he’s sorry for bothering him. And he breathes in, and in, and in, over and over again. Whiskey puts both of his arms around Kent. 

His hands find the gold chain of the necklace he gave to Kent for Christmas and he just holds it, holds the locket in his fist, and holds his fist over Kent’s heart. 

“I’m so lucky to have you,” Whiskey says. 

Kent settles in his arms, he tucks his head against Whiskey’s chest.

“Every part of you,” Whiskey says, “I promise.”

He thinks that maybe, for the first time today, Kent is starting to believe him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i end so many whiskent fics with them just talking and holding each other in bed, and honestly, it's the best way to end it.  
> your comments on this have been lovely and i appreciate every single one of you who's read this so far.   
> Also, please look at Zia's art if you haven't done that already. It's so beautifulhttps://fanartshmanart.tumblr.com/post/630638350144012288/fanartshmanart-i-havent-stopped-thinking-about   
> Everything about it is amazing and I will now gush about it here because you need to look at it. The way Kent looks is just *chefs kiss* he looks so young and vulnerable and the freckles and the acne make him look so little. Seriously, look at it, Zia is fucking amazing and all of the art kicks ass.


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